And now a word from Alan Simpson

Alan Simpson is my favorite retired senator.  Quick transcript of the highlights from today's Global Public Square on CNN, and yes, I had to rewind and make sure I was hearing this correctly:

I think my party and I have different views on a lot of things.  I guess I'm known as a RINO now, which means a Republican in Name Only, because, I guess, of social views perhaps, or [hehe] common sense might be another one which has escaped members of our party.  Abortion is a horrible thing, but for heavens sake, a deeply intimate and personal decision, and men legislatures shouldn't even vote on it.  Gay Lesbian issues, we're all human beings, we're all God's children, what is this?  And for heavens sake, you have Grover Norquist wandering the Earth in his white robes, saying that if you raise taxes one penny, he will defeat you.  He can't murder ya, he can't burn your house, the only thing he can do to you as an elected official is defeat you for reelection.  And if that means more to you than your country when we need Patriots to come out in a situation when we're in extremity, then you shouldn't even BE in Congress.

You can't cut spending your way out of this hole.  You can't grow your way out of this hole.  You can't tax your way out of this hole.  So, put that in your pipe and smoke it, we tell these people.  This is madness.  If you want to be a purist, go somewhere on a mountain top, pray to the East or something.  But if you want to be in politics, you learn to compromise, and you learn to compromise on issues without compromising yourself.  Show me a guy who won't compromise, and I'll show you a guy with rocks for brains.

And you know who will get hurt the worst in that process, when interest rates go up and inflation kicks in?  The little guy, the one that everybody on their hind legs talks about, "We're doing this for the little guy".  The most vulnerable, the unfortunate.  Well, Merry Christmas.  Those guys are going to get eaten when interest rates go up and inflation kicks in.

[On Romney proposed tax cuts, and Bush era tax cuts] I wouldn't have voted for them if I had been in Congress.  How would you have voted for a tax cut if you were doing two wars on the cheap?  You had two wars you were fighting, you had things that were... the Government, all the income for the Government was only taking care of Medicaid and Social Security, and you do a tax cut.  Every time there was a surplus, and the last time was when this fine gentleman was doing it in '96, you can't get there, but you don't have to do a tax cut.  Get that out of your gourd.  You get into the tax expendatures and you start knocking that stuff off, and that's where you get your revenue.

How much more fun would politics be if Senators would actually speak their minds again? 

Mr. Obvious

The New York Times featured an article on mathematical models of losing weight and obesity.  Turns out, to lose weight, one needs to eat less and exercise.  However, this group is all sciency and has charts.

As part of the 97% of American women who want to lose 10 pounds, this sounds familiar.  Can we somehow use math to figure out why it is so hard to eat less and exercise more?  A comprehensive, easy to follow plan would be the break-through of break-throughs.  Until then, I'll just feel mildly disappointed each time I skip the gym to run errands.

Moving on...

When I went to vote in the Indiana primary last week, I was saddened to think that the last time I would vote in the State of Indiana, I would be listed as a Republican.  However, I just couldn't think about Richard Mourdock being seated in the US Senate.  Therefore, crossed party lines, and voted for Lugar.  That's how much I love my country.

I'm leaving the state this summer.  Since the Right-To-Work bill passed, my weak union looks to be even weaker going forward.  Benefit costs have creeped up while pay has stagnated, decreased when looking at real dollars.  Each year that I stay, I make less money.  We finally hit the point last year where expenses were hitting our income.  Time to move on.

Sadly, I found a new opportunity, but not in the Midwest.  I'm off to Ithaca, New York.  We're taking our 5 college degrees with us.  I could make the argument that we're self-selecting.  Over-educated privilidged white kids move to liberal state, leaving Indiana behind to be governed by "Real Americans" who don't need no fancy book learning.  It's an easier equation... education gives us the ability to be mobile, and we're heading off to new opportunities.  Increasingly, they just are not available in the Hoosier State. 

This blog may get more of the tone of a Cubs fan dealing with Yankees fans, but I'll always remain a Midwestern Girl.  Meanwhile, we'll probably look to return to the region in a couple years.  Just not to Indiana.

Evolving

Rand Paul mocked Barack Obama about his views on marriage "evolving".  Really?  Your views on marriage don't evolve?  Because if I still held to the beliefs that I had about marriage on the day that I got married, I would have been divorced long ago.  Of course people's beliefs evolve!  If you are in a good marriage, you understand that the only real threats to your marriage come from within the marriage, not a shadowy, mystic spectre that resides outside of the marriage.  Marriage is not a zero-sum game.  Your happiness is not dependent on the misery of others.  Rather, the more happy people you surround yourself with, the happier you are. 

So, how does gay marriage ruin my marriage exactly?

Sunday Morning Politics: Radicals!

This morning on Face the Nation, Newt Gingrich called Barack Obama "The Most Radical President in United States History." 

Are you as disturbed as I am that someone with a Ph.D. in history has never heard of either Roosevelt?

I am one who defines her politics as liberal, using the term as FDR defined it (generally, protecting the citizenry from market failures, regulating key industries to create markets where players compete on equal footing, and trying to internalize the externalities).  While I had been an avid campaigner for Obama in 2008, I will not be this year, mainly because he is NOT advocating for radical policies.  Health care did not go far enough, tax policy remains skewed in favor of the rich, and the price of education means that those without wealth cannot afford college.

"Radical" refers to those who have considered breaking with past policies to create change.  In the business world, one might call them "Innovative".  You find them on both sides of the political spectrum.  Just a quick list of "radical" presidents that I could think of in five minutes is below.  No, I don't have a Ph.D. in history, but it casts serious doubts about the doctoral program at Tulane.

Radical US Presidents:

• Thomas Jefferson
• James Madison
• James Monroe
• Andrew Jackson
• James Polk
• Abraham Lincoln
• James Garfield (although, radical policies may have cause assassination)
• William McKinley
• Theodore Roosevelt
• Woodrow Wilson
• Franklin Roosevelt
• Harry Truman
• Lyndon Johnson (I'd choose LBJ over JFK for implementation)
• Richard Nixon
• Ronald Reagan
• George W. Bush

Not a bad list to be a part of... maybe Obama should try to be the most radical president in US History.